I feel like I repeat myself all the time. In fact, I am sure I do. I have come across stuff I wrote a decade ago and it sounds like I wrote it yesterday or am just about to write it again! I'm forever spinning my wheels trying to get a good system going but never quite getting there.
So here I go again!
So this is a gluten free, focus on probiotics, omega 3's, iron for anemia, and limit sugar general meal plan.
Breakfast:
2x a week - cream of rice (iron!), grits or non gluten oatmeal, with nuts, seeds, honey or maple syrup and fruit.
2x a week - some kind of yogurt based breakfast: smoothies, parfait made with fruit and granola (probiotics in yogurt!) Yogurt has been an issue with me because I feel I should be making it instead of buying it to be more zero waste. However, this means we simply never have it because I never get around to making it. So I am just going with the yogurt that comes in a jar (plastic seal) because we really do need probiotics in our diet and that is the one I know everyone will happily eat.
3x a week - eggs in some shape or form: banana pancakes, egg and bacon cup (so easy and delicious!), plain old scrambled eggs or fried/poached eggs over hash or potatoes or omelets. (pastured eggs are high in omega 3s)
NB: breakfast is always served with fruit and/or incorporates some kind of veggie as well (in omelet or hash or mixed in with scrambled eggs.) Also trying to eat more nuts and seeds with hot cereal, granola and yogurt.
Lunches:
Lunches are hard because we run around so much in the middle of the day.
1x or 2x a week - good old Annie's gluten free mac and cheese. My teens like these. Must eat this with fruit or veggies.
1x a week - lunch at Chipotle (black beans have iron!)
1x a week - lettuce wrap burger at Five Guys (NB limit of one meal with fries each week).
1x a week - leftovers or Cobb salad with turkey and cheese
1x a week - salmon or tuna salad (omega 3s)
1x a week - leftovers/soup
Snacks:
granola
trail mix
peanuts
popcorn
fruit
fruit with peanut butter
veggies
veggies with hummus
yogurt/smoothie
Dinners must always be served with salad and veggie or two veggies. Salads should include a dusting of either chia or flax seed (omega 3s!). The more leafy greens and nutritous root vegetables the better! I need to find a fermented veggie that people will eat. They hate sauerkraut so that's out. But I've seen carrots and green beans that are supposedly fermented. Maybe if I toss them into a salad, people will eat them.
2x - roast chicken and then something made with leftovers from chicken.
1x beef (iron!)
1x vegetarian
1x seafood (omega 3s)
2x other (soup/stew, ham, pork, lamb, another seafood, etc)
Going gluten free:
Since we had given up crackers and I'd only been buying bread when it was fresh from the bakery and put into my own cloth bag or brown paper bag (because I am trying to be zero waste and don't want plastic packaging), this had actually primed us for eating less wheat. We'd have a couple days a week where there was no bread/crackers in the house. Not that the kids didn't complain about this! But not having bread doesn't feel THAT different (at least to me). Swapping out pasta for gluten free pasta is pretty easy. We already ate rice a couple times a week, now it's more like 3x at least. And I've been buying more corn. We've also been eating more sweet potatoes. And we still eat baking/red/gold potatoes - a couple times a week. This transition hasn't been as hard as I thought it would be.
Limiting sugar to:
Fruit
maple syrup
honey
Homemade or farmer's market jams and fruit butters
Kombucha (going to try to serve this with a meal a couple times a week. I just discovered I can buy this from a tap every week at my new CSA! I actually have 2 CSA's now.
Exceptions:
Allowed 1 soda a week
Dessert on Sundays - ice cream and Tate's gluten free chocolate chip cookies - delicious!
I also want to get the family to take some elderberry juice daily. Beefs up the immune system!
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